[201] The salt springs of this vicinity were noted by Jesuit missionaries in the seventeenth century. By 1770, salt from this region was an article of barter among Indian tribes. The first made by white men was in 1788; primitive methods were followed, however, until in 1797 the state set apart a reservation of thirteen thousand acres, embracing the saline springs, and the next year manufacture on a large scale was begun. Although much of the land was afterwards sold by the state, control of the salines was maintained by the government for a hundred years; in 1898, however, the state finding participation in this manufacture unprofitable, the springs became private property.—Ed.
[202] Manlius was first settled in 1792, when a log-cabin inn was opened upon its site, which was first called Liberty Square. Shortly after 1800 the name was changed to Manlius, and the first postmaster appointed. The town had in 1900 a population of 1,219.
Chittenango and Oneida, in Madison County, were not early settlements, but due to the growth of canals and railroads. Oneida was incorporated in 1848, and had (1900) a population of 6,364.
The site of Canastote (signifying "Cluster of pines") was purchased (1810) by Reuben Perkins; the settlement was, however, due to the canal, and was incorporated in 1835. It has attained a population of about three thousand.—Ed.
[203] The Oneida Indians, one of the "five nations" of the Iroquois confederacy, lived east of the Onondaga, in the present Madison and Oneida counties. In 1788 they ceded their land to New York state, retaining a large reservation, which has been gradually disposed of for successive annuities. About 1820 the project of their removal to Wisconsin was broached, and two delegations representing diverse interests among the Oneida, headed respectively by Dr. Jedidiah Morse, and Reverend Eleazer Williams, visited the West, and entered into arrangements with the Menominee and Winnebago tribes for territory contiguous to Green Bay. These treaties were the subjects of much negotiation, but the controversy was finally settled (1831) by the United States government in favor of the New York Indians. With the Oneida were three tribes of New England Indians—the Stockbridge, Munsee, and Brothertown—who had previously been (in the latter part of the eighteenth century) received among the Oneida in New York. The migration of these various tribes began about 1823, and continued at varying intervals until about 1846, a small remnant only remaining in New York. In Wisconsin they located permanently; the Munsee and Brothertown having assumed citizenship, are for the most part absorbed in the white population of Brown, Outagamie, and Calumet counties, chiefly the last named, although a few are mingled with the Oneida on their reservation near Green Bay. The latter number about two thousand, and are in a fairly prosperous condition, chiefly farmers. On the Stockbridge reservation in Shawano County there are about five hundred engaged in farming and lumbering. Consult Wisconsin Historical Collections, ii, pp. 415-449; xv, pp. 25-209; and J. N. Davidson, Unnamed Wisconsin (Milwaukee, 1895).—Ed.
[204] Oneida Castle was located south of the modern town of that name, in Lenox Township, Madison County, on the borders of Oneida County. At this village Reverend Samuel Kirkland established himself as a missionary in 1766, and it was chiefly due to his influence that the main body of the Oneida remained neutral during the Revolutionary War. After the removal to Wisconsin a few of the tribe clung to their original home, and about a hundred and fifty are still to be found in this vicinity.—Ed.
[205] Verona's first settlement was made in 1797 by Captain Ichabod Hand, who kept a tavern on the road from Rome to Oneida Castle.
New London is a small hamlet in Oneida County, erected during the progress of the canal. Its first settler came in 1824, and the following year a post-office was erected.—Ed.
[206] The site of Rome was on the Oneida portage between the Mohawk Valley and waters flowing into Lake Ontario. As early as 1756 the English had erected Fort Bull at the western extremity of the portage, but this was promptly captured and destroyed by French troops. Two years later, Fort Stanwix was erected by the British general of that name; the cost was $60,000, and the fort was heavily garrisoned until the close of the French and Indian War. In 1768 the famous treaty with the Iroquois, making a great land cession to the English colonies took place at this outpost. At the outbreak of the Revolution the name of the fort was changed to Schuyler, and the next year (1777) it was besieged by Major Barry St. Leger with a force of Indian allies; the post was finally relieved by General Benedict Arnold. The first settler near the fort was a German, Johann Reuff (or Roof). He fled at the time of the siege, and the place was without inhabitants until 1785-87, when New England colonists began to arrive. The site of Rome was purchased by a New York merchant named Lynch who laid out a town (1796) and called it Lynchburg; this was later changed for the classic cognomen, and the village of Rome incorporated in 1819.—Ed.
[207] Oriskany (Indian dialect, signifying "nettles") was the site of the battle of August 6, 1777, when General Nicholas Herkimer, of the American army, repulsed the invading British forces under Major St. Leger. The village was settled in 1802 by Colonel Garrett Lansing, a Revolutionary soldier, and a post-office opened about 1821.—Ed.